


Oenothera

by lunarknightz



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-29
Updated: 2010-08-29
Packaged: 2017-10-11 08:16:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 389
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/110311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lunarknightz/pseuds/lunarknightz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After it's over, Katniss remembers.  Spoilers for Mockingjay.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Oenothera

Next to our house, primroses bloom.

The scent of roses will forever remind me of horrible things, of blood and death, of Snow. I don't allow roses in my house.

I have seen enough death.

It was Peeta's idea to plant primroses. He gathered them in the woods and planted them along the edges of our house. The evening primrose is not the same plant as the roses that haunt me. It does not have the same sickeningly sick smell.

My sister was named after the evening primrose. A sister who I tried to protect with all my might, but could not. I hunted to feed her, provided for her when my mother was broken and could not. I thought that taking her place in the Hunger Games would guarantee her a happy and long life. I couldn't picture war back then. Who could, back when we were innocent?

Prim died in the war.

For years, all the primroses reminded me of was my loss.

As more people began to return to District 12, I took over where my mother and sister had left off. The family book, of leaves and remedies was still valuable in this brand new world. People still get sick and die, even when the ravages of war have disappeared.

One night, a desperate mother brought her ailing child, a young boy no more than five years old, to our house for healing. The child's cough whooped and echoed through the halls. I searched through the book, looking for something that could save this child's life.

An infusion of primrose saved the child's life.

My sister was taking medical training before she died. Prim had always been talented at healing, just like my mother. Her calm and steady nature was great for one in the medical profession, more caring than judging, hardly excitable. She would have gone on to save many lives, had she lived.

Since the day that the primrose saved the child from the whooping cough, I have ceased resenting the primrose. Their careful beauty is no longer a reminder that my sister has died.

To see the primroses bloom is soothing to me. It is a reminder that Primrose Everdeen lived. And she lived well, saving more in her short life than I will ever, in my much longer time in Panem.


End file.
